• The skull of Tyrannosaurus rex acted like a giant shock absorber to support his flesh-ripping lifestyle.
• Brazilian scientists have discovered a ratfish, a species of fish that has been swimming the seas since dinosaurs walked the Earth.
• The mystery of the longest surviving mammoths.
• Scientists have discovered skeletons in southern Mexico that could be more than 3,000 years old. Olmecs? Video and pics.
• The huge mound on the Rum River couldn't be a burial site because, 'It's beyond human comprehension, building something like that'.
• Ancient maps and corn help track the migrations of indigenous people.
• Prehistoric rock faces in Northumberland baffle the experts. For more baffling, visit the University of Newcastle upon Tyne Northumberland Website and see the rock art photo gallery.
• Egyptian tombs older than the great pyramids of Giza reveal a complex society.
• Federal police have seized dinosaur eggs and fossils worth millions of dollars during raids south of Perth.
• U.S. Customs officials have returned to Guatemala 26 pieces of Mayan artifacts that survived the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
• Ding! Your mail has been intercepted. Five mummified skulls from a pre-Inca culture were discovered in the Peru mail.
• If research released by the Vatican is right, the Inquisition was not as bad as one might think.
• A guy in Tanzania laced his wife's half-eaten body with poison to kill rogue lions that are terrorizing villages. It worked.
• Donkeys once heehawed out of Africa.
• Science and native Indian spirituality clash over a lost and lonely killer whale (who may be a reincarnated chief) on Canada's Pacific Coast.
• Chinese panda porn results in a pregnant female. Kinky.
• It's not exactly the Star Trek transporter, but scientists have performed a successful teleportation on atoms for the first time.
• Pollution controls are going very well in California. The woman who helped design Southern California's pollution-credit anti-smog program was arrested for allegedly defrauding companies.
• Scientists say they have found how to change promiscuous wayward males into attentive home-loving husbands. Make them into steers?
• Researchers are developing devices aimed at protecting pilots and soldiers from blinding lasers.
• NASA data shows that hurricanes help plants bloom in 'ocean deserts'.
• A German zoologist says bees aren't as busy as people are led to believe.
• The high priest of British white witches plans to contact Nessie's ghost in a séance.
• There's nothing natural about this alien invasion.
• The secret Cold War program Skyhook was the likely progenitor of many key aspects of UFO mythology.
• The surface of this comet surprised NASA.
• Researchers show how Jupiter's moon Io vaporize rock gases into atmosphere.
• Did comets flood Earth’s oceans?
• How would aliens from Mars view us?

Quote of the Day:

New and stirring things are belittled because if they are not belittled, the humiliating question arises, 'Why then are you not taking part in them?'

H. G. Wells

• Archaeologist solves mystery of monk who stole the bones of a saint.
• Review of Ancient Medicine (Amazon US/UK) by Vivian Nutton, which details the story of ancient medicine from early Greece (8th century BC) to Late Antiquity (7th century AD).
• Project Ghost Hunt has plenty of fun with pub spirits after closing time. It's a one-liner with no extra help required.
• Ghosts also for San Antonio Paranormal Investigators at the Jailhouse Cafe.
• SpaceShipOne runs on rubber fuel. Flubber?
• Not content to be doing great things with SpaceshipOne, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen is also behind the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame. Get your Enterprise uniform on and beam on down if you're in the area.
• President Bush's Moon to Mars Commission labels NASA a 'relic of the Apollo age'. Sounds like NASA's about to be torn apart.
• Perhaps not if John Kerry is elected: "NASA is an invaluable asset to the American people and must receive adequate resources to continue its important mission of exploration."
• Utah rocks could help explain Martian 'blueberries'.
• Astrobiology continues its excellent 7-part series on the 'Great Terraforming Debate' with Part 3. Also see Part 1 and 2. Tres cool astrobiologist David Grinspoon is one of the participants, make sure you read my review of his book Lonely Planets as well - definitely worth purchasing, it's a great read (available from Amazon US and UK).
• Quantum computing a step closer as scientists confirm quantum teleportation. Where does the science end and the magic begin?
• Octupuses have a preferred arm. I know left and right, but what do we call the ones in-between? And shouldn't that be octopi?
• Five UFOs in the sky above Emley.
• Meteorite the 'size of a house' explodes over Australia. Gotta love the police statement: "There was no bloody great rock sitting in the middle of the highway, anyway".
• Are mountain lions attacking pets in Kentucky?
• Listen to your dreams - you never know when you might have to save someone from a rocket fuel explosion.
• Thoughts captured in real-time.
• Medical implants to be powered by body heat.
• Anti-depressant nerve stimulator device approved by FDA.
• UK and US conspiring on nukes?
• Weapons that can incapacitate crowds of people by sweeping a lightning-like beam of electricity across them are being readied for sale to military and police forces in the US and Europe. And the funny thing is - we pay the wages of these government research organisations. Go figure.
• Laurence Gardner on ancient secret science.
• Big oil and the wars on drugs and terrorism.
• Astounding discovery from old moon images.
• Fractional Reserve Banking as Economic Parasitism.
• I sing the body's pattern recognition machine.
• An inflatable space.
• Acid-fast bacteria implicated in prostate cancer?
• Corruption of intelligence has caused the greatest foreign policy catastrophe in modern U.S. history.
• Why did Ike support revising the pledge of allegiance.
• Are there really mole people living under New York City?
• Odd (b)lack hole defies explanantion.
• Cannabis triggers transient schizophrenia-like symptoms. Next: cannabis can reduce symptoms of autism.
• Phoebe's surface reveals clue to origin.
• Cosmetic surgery was born 2500 years ago and came of age in the inferno of the Western Front.
• Psychology and the conflict in Iraq.
• Bioterror grand jury trial begins for art professor.
• Testosterone damps pain sensation in males.
• Rupert Sheldrake: The need for open-minded scepticism - a reply to David Marks.
• Some think telepathy is biologically based.
• In the shadow of Babylon.
• Archaeologists in Egypt unearth 5000 year old necropolis with 20 tombs.

Quote of the Day:

There are three classes of intellects: one which comprehends by itself; another which appreciates what others comprehend; and a third which neither comprehends by itself nor by the showing of others; the first is the most excellent, the second is good, and the third is useless.

Machiavelli

• Taking life's final exit. Really nice piece.
• Climber says Mount Everest is haunted by spirits.
• Teenagers really like the new magazine-style Revolve Bible. Wonder what'll be in the next issue?
• 'Invisibility cloak' inventor looks to make invisible walls, as others worry about the criminal implications. "It would become incredibly difficult to spot a thief...if the items they were taking were simply disappearing under the cloak." Ummm, doesn't that happen with a normal cloak/coat/pocket anyhow?
• Memory fails under stress, throwing into doubt witness testimony extracted during psychological trauma.
• Cocaine vaccine stops addiction.
• Parkinson's vaccine shows promise.
• Independent inquiry to be held into Gulf War Syndrome.
• Scientists determine solar storm speed limit. Who's going to give the Sun a ticket?
• Taiwanese space authorities say they may sell imagery from their brand-spankin' Earth Observation satellite.
• Cassini sends back some nice pictures of Phoebe. No, not some Italian voyeur on holiday...it's the Cassini space probe.
• Milky Way's satellite enigma solved.
• Giving life back to Mars - a debate on terraforming the Red Planet. Astrobiology just keeps serving up the tasty stuff.
• Nessie, UFOs, and ghosts - where are they all? I think the best measure of weirdness is my spare time...and it has been non-existent for a couple of months. Somebody pass on a few decent web addresses to this guy.
• Analysis of the Utah UFO. Obviously can't be a UFO as we're in a weirdness drought.
• But wait, there's more - exhibition traces UFO signs in Slovakia.
• Researcher returns for another crack at the Sumatran Yeti (known to his friends as orang-pendek).
• What do you do with a piece of UFO? Leave it at the scene like a hubcap?
• Research on Nazi underground systems.
• American travel writer Bill Bryson wins the Aventis Prize for his book A Short History Of Nearly Everything (Amazon US/UK).
• Divers fail to find Babe Ruth's piano in Sudbury Pond. It's like a mix'n'match headline isn't it?
• Richard Branson sets the record for the fastest crossing of the English Channel by an amphibious vehicle. If Sir Rich needs to spend big to keep himself entertained, me and my balloon animals are just waiting for the call.
• Iraqi authorities smash illegal trade in ancient artifacts.
• More on the new discovery in Egypt.

Quote of the Day:

What if Earth
Be but t' shadow of Heaven, and things therein,
Each to the other like more than on earth is thought?

Milton

• Fossil finds source of ancient mythical creatures. "And lo Jesus and the disciples walked to Nazareth. But the trail was blocked by a giant brontosaurus... with a splinter in his paw."
• Sasquatch thumbs a ride in the Yukon.
• Astrology: searching for respect.
• Ireland's first UFO conference gets underway. Begorrah, the little people have taken wing!
• French Quarter ghosts identified. I'm guessing they didn't use dental records.
• Are Out of Body Experiences (OBEs) just a result of a ticklish angular gyrus?
• Is there a better way to spend a Saturday than at a Skunk Ape festival?
• People don't want to go to Lake County Jail, and not just for the obvious reason. Disembodied voices, physical manifestations and moving crosses all add to the cheery atmosphere.
• Ancient necropolis uncovered in Egypt.
• Masada may have fell, but it won't collapse.
• The Irish Pompeii.
• Chinese used complex machines to work jewellry more than 2,500 years ago.
• Community announcement: have you lost a gold-coloured wonder-bra? People over 1,000 years of age only please.
• Five mummified skulls found in the Peru mail. That would have to be a big padded envelope.
• Spirit rises as Opportunity descends. No, not a whacky motivational proverb...just another day of Mars exploration.
• Everyone's talking about the family house in New Zealand bombarded with a stone from heaven.
• Space station in peril.
• Virgin boss Richard Branson heads for space. Hot tip is to avoid the space station Rich.
• Why all the twins suddenly in Sydney?
• Miracle recoveries...they ain't so miraculous.
• Spinal repair robot gets FDA nod.
• Microscopy has moved into the pico level. Rough translation: really freakin' small!
• Dogs understand languages. Qualifer required: 'a few'. And not before 'languages'.

Quote of the Day:

We all walk in mysteries. We are surrounded by an atmosphere of which we do not know what is stirring in it, or how it is connected with our own spirit. So much is certain, that in particular cases we can put out the feelers of our soul beyond its bodily limits, and that a presentiment, nay, an actual insight into the immediate future, is accorded to it.

Goethe

• Global warming. Rising sea levels. Massive volcanic activity around the world. Widespread erosion. It’s not a scene from the latest Hollywood disaster film, The Day After Tomorrow, but the Earth as it appeared during the mid- to late-Cretaceous geological period, 135-million to 65-million years ago, when the largest dinosaurs ruled the planet.
• The smallest dinosaur was the size of a sparrow!
• Dinosaurs did not engage in head-to-head combat.
• Rat study elucidates long-ago human migration.
• A Mayan priest comments about the rare Venus transit. Yeah, well, what does he know? ;o)
• Allowing a mammoth expansion of North Dakota's largest coal mine would cut a devastating swath through American Indian graves and cultural symbols. Easy call if one doesn't need electricity from that coal.
• Archaeologists have dug up a thousand-year-old padded bra.
• Spiral patterns carved into a small jade ring show use of complex machines more than 2500-years ago.
• A former circus owner bought Wookey Hole a year ago and said the bones of a witch should be returned to the cave there. Toss-up.
• Building starts on Texas Stonehenge.
• It was not wars, but water woes, that ended Angkor's empire.
• Hoping to learn more about undersea volcanoes, scientists capture an underwater eruption on tape. Do those eruptions make the water warmer?
• Why the 'Lost Gospels' lost out.
• Soaking string in the blood of a black dog and wrapping it around homes offers protection from the dreaded phi porp – a female ghost that kills married men and eats their innards. Some days it just doesn't pay to be a black dog.
• A dead wallaby discovered on a remote Scottish island sparks a mystery.
• Mad-Cow disease in cattle and human beings.
• Follow-up: Everyone's got an opinion on the photo of a mysterious creature.
• Here's some good news for those people who talk to dogs. That's you, isn't it?
• The world's most famous endangered species, the Chinese giant panda, appears to be in much better shape than previously thought.
• New research shows that the seasons may be involved in the onset of menopause.
• Clowns can strike terror into some people's hearts. I've never liked clowns.
• The tale of a boy whose brain keeps telling him he's still hungry.
• Lights-out policies in cities are helping to save the lives of thousands of migrating birds.
• It's big head and bulging eyes, this ugly-cuss, rare sea creature washes ashore. Click on the 'IMAGES'.
• Pumping energy to nanocrystals from a quantum well.
• Top quark measurements give the God particle a new lease on life.
• Microscopy moves to the picoscale.
• UA study on near-death experiences looks at brain.
• See the flood plains on Mars courtesy of the the ESA Mars Express spacecraft.
• Pterosaurs are still living on the islands of Papua New Guinea. Lots of videos of people that have seen Pterosaurs; no video of Pterosaurs.
• The giant blast over New Zealand is believed to be a meteor.
• Researchers have for the first time detected molecular nitrogen in interstellar space.
• This odd black hole defies explanation. Don't they all?

Quote of the Day:

Time is a great teacher, but unfortunately it kills all its pupils.

Hector Berlioz